The enchanted unit now has a Magical Melee Attack if it did not already have a better one.

Flame Blade is an UncommonUnit Enchantment belonging to the Chaos Magic realm. For 125 it may be cast on a Normal Unit or Hero on the overland map to ignite its weapons with a magical flame, making its attack stronger. The unit receives a Melee Attack bonus of +2, and is now considered to be a Magical Melee Attack (if not already better). If the unit has a Ranged Missile Attack, it receives +2 as well. If the unit already has a Thrown Attack, it receives +2 to this attack's strength.

Alternatively, a cheaper version of the same spell may be cast for 25 during combat, in which case it will temporarily bestow the same bonus on a unit for the duration of the battle (with no permanent effects or upkeep costs).

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The first bonus bestowed by Flame Blade is to turn the enchanted unit's Melee Attack into a Magical Melee Attack.

With its Magical Weapons, the enchanted unit can now attack targets possessing Weapon Immunity without increasing those targets' Defense score.

This bonus applies only if the unit had Normal Melee Weapons before this spell was cast upon it. Units already possessing Mithril Weapons or Adamantium Weapons will not "downgrade" to Magical Weapons as a result of this spell.

If the unit possesses any Melee Attack at all, the strength of its attack is increased by +2.

This increases the potential amount of Damage caused by the unit's Melee Attack (and Counter Attack), and subsequently the average damage as well.

Note that Melee Attack is increased on a per figure basis. Therefore, a Multi-Figure unit much more from this than a Single-Figure unit. For example, an 8-figure unit at full health actually gets an increase to total attack strength worth 16 (8 * 2 = 16).

If the unit possesses a Ranged Missile Attack, the strength of this attack is increased by +2.

This increases the potential amount of Damage caused by the unit's Ranged Attack, and subsequently the average damage as well.

Note that Ranged Attack is increased on a per figure basis. Therefore, a Multi-Figure unit benefits much more from this than a Single-Figure unit. For example, an 8-figure unit at full health actually gets an increase to total attack strength worth 16 (8 * 2 = 16).

This bonus is not applied to units possessing a Ranged Boulder Attack or Attack.

If the unit possesses a Thrown Attack, the strength of this attack is increased by +2.

This increases the potential amount of Damage caused by the unit's Thrown Attack, and subsequently the average damage as well.

Note that Thrown Attack is increased on a per figure basis. Therefore, a Multi-Figure unit benefits much more from this than a Single-Figure unit. For example, an 8-figure unit at full health actually gets an increase to total attack strength worth +16 (8 * 2 = 16).

Despite its name and implied effect, Flame Blade does not cause the unit's Melee Attack nor Ranged Attack to deliver Fire Damage. The unit will still deliver Melee Damage as normal, or another damage type if attained from an ability or another spell.

This is actually a good thing, because Fire Damage would only mean that Fire Immune targets wouldn't suffer this damage from the attack.

Flame Blade may be cast during combat for a base Casting Cost of 25. In this case, the spell will only affect the targeted unit until the end of the battle - at which point it will dissipate.

Alternatively, Flame Blade may be cast on the overland map for a lasting effect. In this case it has a base Casting Cost of 125, and requires an Upkeep Cost of 2 per turn to maintain. Failure to pay this Upkeep Cost due to lack of Mana will cause the spell to dissipate. However, as long as the spell is paid for (and not dispelled by any rival Wizard), the unit continues to enjoy its bonus.

Flame Blade may only be cast on friendly Normal Units and Heroes. It cannot target Fantastic Creatures. If the desired target is in an overland army stack, click on that stack to get a list of units inside it, and then select your desired unit.

Note that during battle, Flame Blade may not be cast on any units mutated by the Chaos Channels spell. Nonetheless you may target these units freely on the overland map, and the effects will carry into combat. The Undead are not valid targets in either case.

Once the spell is in effect, the unit will glow with a Red aura, unless there is a more powerful spell also affecting it.

If you've placed Flame Blade on a unit, you may remove it by examining the unit's details and clicking the Enchantment's icon. The primary reason to do this would be in order to remove the spell's Upkeep Cost, thus conserving Mana for other spells.

As an UncommonChaos spell, Flame Blade may become available to any Wizard who possesses at least one ChaosSpellbook. However, its availability during the game is almost never guaranteed.

Customized Wizards possessing 11 Spellbooks at creation time may choose this spell as one of their default spells before starting the game, in which case the spell will already be researched and available for casting immediately on the first turn.

Wizards who possess at least 8 Spellbooks, or Wizards with 11 Spellbooks who did not select Flame Blade as a guaranteed spell, will be able to Research this spell at some point during their campaign. Wizards with fewer than 8 Spellbooks have a random chance of being able to Research it. The chance for this spell to appear increases with the number of Chaos Spellbooks the Wizard possesses or obtains during gameplay.

With at least 1 Spellbook, the Flame Blade spell may be acquired as a reward for winning encounters in creature Lairs, Towers, et cetera, or when conquering the Fortress of a rival wizard who has already researched this spell.

Flame Blade confers a significant bonus to both Melee Attack units and Ranged Attack units, and especially to units that use both (they enjoy both effects). Furthermore, it allows the unit to effectively attack targets possessing the Weapon Immunity ability, and so may be very useful for taking down such targets in the early game before Magical Melee Weapons can be acquired.

The spell is helpful when cast on Single-Figure units - but its full potential is achieved when cast on Multi-Figure units, and the more figures the better. This is because the unit's total attack strength is actually increased by 2 * the number of live figures in the unit. Therefore, this spell is best cast on units with 6-8 figures.

Flame Blade can make even a weak, low-tier Normal Unit significantly more dangerous than it would be otherwise. This makes Flame Blade a great spell to research early on in the campaign.